1. Oliver Scheer
Senior Technical Evangelist
Microsoft Deutschland
http://the-oliver.com
Building Windows Phone
Applications
2. Agenda
Designing Windows Phone Applications
This module
follows on from the
previous, in which
we go through the
essential
knowledge you
need to build an
application
In this module:
• Page navigation
• Application Bar
• Handling Page Orientation Changes
• Handling Different Screen Resolutions
• Localization
• Windows Phone Toolkit
• Page Transitions
4. • Frame
• Top-level container control
• PhoneApplicationFrame class
• Contains the page control and system
elements such as system tray and
application bar
• Page
• Fills entire content region of the frame
• PhoneApplicationPage-derived class
• Contains a title
• Optionally surfaces its own application bar
Frame and Page
5. Page Navigation
•XAML apps on Windows Phone use a
page-based navigation model
• Similar to web page model
• Each page identified by a URI
• Each page is essentially stateless
private void HyperlinkButton_Click_1(
object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
NavigationService.Navigate(
new Uri("/SecondPage.xaml", UriKind.Relative));
}
6. Navigating Back
• Application can provide controls to navigate back
to preceding page
• The hardware Back key will also navigate back to
preceding page
• No code required – built-in behaviour
private void Button_Click_1(
object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
NavigationService.GoBack();
}
7. Overriding Back Key
• May need to override Back hardware key if ‘back to previous page’ is not logical behaviour
• For example, when displaying a popup panel
• User would expect Back key to close the panel,
not the page
8. Overriding the Back Key
8
<phone:PhoneApplicationPage
x:Class="PhoneApp1.MainPage"
…
shell:SystemTray.IsVisible="True"
BackKeyPress="PhoneApplicationPage_BackKeyPress">
In code:
private void PhoneApplicationPage_BackKeyPress(object sender,
System.ComponentModel.CancelEventArgs e)
{
e.Cancel = true; // Tell system we've handled it
// Hide the popup...
...
}
9. Passing Data Between Pages
• Can pass string data between pages using query strings
• On destination page
private void passParam_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
NavigationService.Navigate(new Uri("/SecondPage.xaml?msg=" + textBox1.Text, UriKind.Relative));
}
protected override void OnNavigatedTo(System.Windows.Navigation.NavigationEventArgs e)
{
base.OnNavigatedTo(e);
string querystringvalue = "";
if (NavigationContext.QueryString.TryGetValue("msg", out querystringvalue))
textBlock1.Text = querystringvalue;
}
10. Passing Objects Between Pages
• Often, you will pass a data object from one page to another
• E.g., user selects an item in a list and navigates to a Details
page
• One solution is to store your ViewModel (that is, data)
in your App class
• Global to whole application
• Pass the ID of the selected item in query string
// Navigate to the new page
NavigationService.Navigate(new Uri("/DetailsPage.xaml?selectedItem=" +
(MainLongListSelector.SelectedItem as ItemViewModel).ID, UriKind.Relative));
11. Handling Non Linear Navigation
• Design your app navigation strategy carefully!
• If you navigate from ‘third page’ to ‘main page’ and
your user then presses the Back key, what happens?
• User expects app to exit
• App actually navigates back to Third Page
• Solution for Windows Phone 7.0 was complex code to
handle back navigation correctly, or the Non-Linear
Navigation Recipe library from AppHub
• Windows Phone APIs:
• NavigationService.RemoveBackEntry()
11
12. NavigationService.RemoveBackEntry()
• When ‘Third Page’ navigates back to MainPage, put a marker in the query string
• In OnNavigatedTo() in MainPage, look for the marker and if present, remove the ‘ Third Page’,
‘SecondPage’ and original instance of ‘MainPage’ from the navigation history stack
12
NavigationService.Navigate(new Uri("/MainPage.xaml?homeFromThird=true", UriKind.Relative));
protected override void OnNavigatedTo(NavigationEventArgs e)
{
if (e.NavigationMode == System.Windows.Navigation.NavigationMode.New
&& NavigationContext.QueryString.ContainsKey("homeFromThird"))
{
NavigationService.RemoveBackEntry(); // Remove ThirdPage
NavigationService.RemoveBackEntry(); // Remove SecondPage
NavigationService.RemoveBackEntry(); // Remove original MainPage
}
base.OnNavigatedTo(e);
}
16. Don’t fill all 4 slots if not needed
Use the ApplicationBar instead of creating
your own menu system
Up to 4 buttons plus optional menu
Swipe up the bar to bring up the menu
Swipe up the bar to bring up the menu
ApplicationBar
19. If Application Bar opacity is less than 1, displayed
page will be the size of the screen Application Bar
overlays screen content
If Opacity is 1, displayed page is resized to the area
of the screen not covered by the Application Bar
ApplicationBar Opacity
19
23. Phone UI Design – Orientation
• This application does not work in landscape mode at the moment
• Not all applications do, or need to
• You can configure applications to support portrait or landscape
23
24. New Device Tab in Visual Studio 2012
• View Designer in Portrait or Landscape
3/17/201424
25. Selecting Orientations
• A XAML property for the phone application page lets you select the orientation options
available
• Your application can bind to an event which is fired when the orientation changes
25
SupportedOrientations="Portrait"
SupportedOrientations="PortraitOrLandscape"
26. Layout May Need Altering
3/17/201426
Layout unaltered
Layout optimised for
landscape
27. Using a Grid to Aid Landscape Layout
• In the Grid, the second column is unused in Portrait
27
<phone:PivotItem Header="recipe">
<Grid>
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition Width="*"/>
<ColumnDefinition Width="Auto"/>
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition Height="Auto"/>
<RowDefinition Height="240"/>
<RowDefinition Height="*"/>
<RowDefinition Height="Auto"/>
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
...
</Grid>
Row 0
Row 1
Row 2
Row 3
Column 0
28. Move Elements in Landscape Layout
• In Landscape, the recipe description moves into the second row and the second column and
the third row of the grid is now unused. Since that row’s Height is “*”, it shrinks to zero.
28
<phone:PivotItem Header="recipe">
<Grid>
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition Width="*"/>
<ColumnDefinition Width="Auto"/>
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition Height="Auto"/>
<RowDefinition Height="240"/>
<RowDefinition Height="*"/>
<RowDefinition Height="Auto"/>
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
...
</Grid>
Row 0
Row 1
Row 2
Row 3
Column 0 Column 1
33. • Well, No…
• As developers, we work with device independent pixels
• OS applies a scale factor to the actual resolution
So I Have to Do Three Different UIs?
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential33
Resolution Aspect ratio Scale Factor Scaled resolution
WVGA 800 x 480 15:9 1.0x scale 800 x 480
WXGA 1280 x 768 15:9 1.6x scale 800 x 480
720p 1280 x 720 16:9
1.5x scale, 80 pixels
taller (53 pixels, before
scaling)
853 x 480
35. • Set Grid Row Height to “Auto” to size
according to the controls placed within it
• Set Grid Row Height to “*” to take up all the
rest of the space
• If you size multiple rows using “*”, available
space is divided up evenly between them
Use “Auto” and “*” on Grid Rows To Ensure Good Layout
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential35
<Grid>
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition Height="240"/>
<RowDefinition Height="*"/>
<RowDefinition Height="Auto"/>
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
...
</Grid>
36. Adaptive Layout Using Grid
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential36
WVGA 720p
Image height sized
explicitly at 240px
Bottom row is “Auto” so
sized to hold a TextBlock
Directions row is “*” so
gets everything that’s left
– ends up taller on 720p
37. • In most cases, you should supply images targeting the WXGA (1280 x 768) screen
• WXGA assets are of the highest quality
• Will automatically scale down on WVGA phones
• Still look great on 720p (1280 x 720)
• If you want, you can include images at each of the three resolutions in your project
• E.g. MyImage.wvga.png, MyImage.wxga.png and MyImage.720p.png
• At runtime, get Application.Current.Host.Content.ScaleFactor to determine the
resolution of the screen on the current phone, returns 100 for WVGA, 160 for WXGA and 150 for
720p
• Write code to load image at runtime appropriate for the current screen resolution
Images
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential37
38. • To add a splash screen to your project suitable for all resolutions, add a file as content
called SplashScreenImage.jpg at 768 x 1280 resolution
• The framework automatically scales it to the correct size on different resolution screens
• If you want to provide pixel-perfect splash screens for all resolutions, add images with the
following names:
• SplashScreenImage.Screen-WVGA.jpg
• SplashScreenImage.Screen-WXGA.jpg
• SplashScreenImage.Screen-720p.jpg
• In addition to these images, you must still include the default SplashScreenImage.jpg file
Splash Screens
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential38
39. • You must supply app icon and tile images sized for WXGA
• The framework automatically scales to the correct size for WVGA and 720p
App Icon and Tiles
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential39
Tile size WXGA
Application Icon 100 × 100
Small 159 × 159
Medium 336 × 336
Large 691 × 336
42. • Windows Phone 8 supports 50 display languages (shipped with the
phone depending on market and country/region) and selectable by
the user on the language+region section of the Settings page
• Windows Phone 7.1 supported only 24
• Windows Phone 8 allows you to build apps that read from right to
left
Windows Phone 8 Language Support
3/17/2014
43. • Every new project you create in Visual Studio 2012 has a class
included called LocalizedStrings
• Simply provides programmatic access to resources
• An instance of this is create in App.xaml in the Application Resources
with the key LocalizedStrings
• Every new project also includes a resources file:
ResourcesAppResources.resx
• Some strings already defined in here
• Create all your string literals in here to support localization
• All new projects also included commented-out code in
MainPage.xaml.cs to setup a localized Application Bar
New Project Templates Have Localization Support Built In
3/17/2014
44. • Databind the Text property of your
TextBlock and other controls to the
StaticResource with a key of
LocalizedStrings
• That is an instance of the
LocalizedStrings class
• It provides access to string
resources
Accessing String Resources from XAML
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential44
45. • Double-click project properties to open the Properties editor
• On the Application tab
• Check each of the
languages your app
will support
• Save the Project Properties
• Visual Studio creates new
AppResources files for each
selected language/culture
Add Support for Additional Languages
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential45
46. • Visual Studio adds a resource file for each additional language that the app will support.
Each resource file is named using the correct culture/language name, as described in
Culture and language support for Windows Phone in the documentation
• For example:
• For the culture Spanish (Spain), file is AppResources.es-ES.resx.
• For the culture German (Germany), file is AppResources.de-DE.resx.
• Supply appropriate translations in each resource file
Translate the Additional Languages Resource Files
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential46
47. • Double-click WMAppManifest.xml to open the manifest editor
• On the Packaging tab
• Set the Default Language
to the language of your
default resources
• This identifies the language of the
strings in the default resources file.
For example, if the strings in the
default resources file are English
(United Kingdom) language strings,
you would select English (United Kingdom) as the Neutral Language for the project
Define the Default Language
3/17/2014Microsoft confidential47
50. Windows Phone Toolkit
• A product of the Microsoft Windows Phone team
• Formerly known as the ‘Silverlight Toolkit’
• The Windows Phone Toolkit adds new functionality ‘out of band’ from the official product
control set
• Includes full open source code, samples, documentation, and design-time support for controls
for Windows Phone
• Refresh every three months or so
• Bug fixes
• New controls
50
51. How to Get the Windows Phone Toolkit
• http://phone.codeplex.com
• Get source code, including the
sample application
• No MSI! – Install binaries from
NuGet only
52. NuGet
• Package management system for .NET
• Simplifies incorporating third-party libraries
• Developer focused
• Free, open source
• NuGet client is included in Visual
Studio 2012 – including Express Editions!
• Use NuGet to add libraries such as
the Windows Phone Toolkit to projects
59. …And Many More
• Custom MessageBox
• Rating control
• AutoCompleteBox
• ExpanderView
• HubTile
• …more…
• Download the source from http://Silverlight.codeplex.com, build the sample application
and deploy to emulator or device
3/17/201459
61. Page Transitions
• Easy way to add page transitions to your app similar to those in
the built-in apps
• Different transitions are included
• Roll, Swivel, Rotate, Slide and Turnstile
• Start by using the TransitionFrame control from the Windows
Phone Toolkit instead of the default PhoneApplicationFrame
• Set in InitializePhoneApplication() method in App.Xaml.cs:
62. Enabling Transitions on a Page
• Declare namespace for Windows Phone Toolkit assembly
• Under <phone:PhoneApplicationPage> root element, add transition you want
63. TiltEffect
• Add additional visual feedback for control interaction
• Instead of simple states such as Pressed or Unpressed, controls with TiltEffect enabled
provide motion during manipulation
• For example, Button has a subtle 3D effect and appears to move into the page when
pressed and bounce back again when released
• Easy to enable TiltEffect for all controls on a page
• Also can apply to individual controls
65. Review
• Navigation to pages is performed on the basis of a URI (Uniform Resource Indicator) values
• The back button normally navigates back to the previous page, but this can be overridden
• The URI can contain a query string to pass contextual string data
• Support for Localization is incorporated into the project templates
• Supporting different screen resolutions is simplified because they are scaled to a near-identical
effective resolution.
• Supply images scaled for WXGA and they will be scaled down automatically for lower screen
resolutions.
• The Windows Phone Toolkit is an out of band method for Microsoft to release additional tools and
libraries outside of Visual Studio release cycles
• http://silverlight.codeplex.com
• The toolkit includes Page transitions and TiltEffect with which you can add common animations to your
applications
